The ancient art of wood engraving requires introspection and secrecy in order to create intriguing and intricate pieces of work, discovers Clive Aslet.
If you want an antidote to the computer screen, turn to wood engraving. ‘We’ve reached 1790, with dashes of the 1920s,’ discloses one practitioner, who would rather not be named for fear of incurring the wrath of other artists. This is an art, with a strong admixture of craft, in which it routinely takes days, if not weeks or months, to produce works of unassuming dimension—so small that they’re sometimes best appreciated with the help of a magnifying glass.
‘OCD,’ declares another exhibitor at the annual show by the Society of Wood Engravers (SWE), of the temperament required. ‘It’s ridiculous,’ admits Peter Lawrence, whose work is given pride of place as this year’s featured artist, of the amount of labour involved. ‘I like to include humour. That becomes difficult when you may be working on the same piece for 300 hours.’
For the collector, however, the obsessiveness of the artists yields a glorious reward. In relation to the amount of time spent in producing them, these modestly priced works —they rarely cost more than a few hundred pounds—are the steal of the century. Produced not in warehouse-sized studios, but often on kitchen tables, the works are intimate, if not always in subject, then in the mode of creation. This invites introspection, even secretiveness, and I’m told that artists ​are often astonished to discover what their peers have been working on and the methods involved.
For strangely, as the SWE exhibition, now touring the country, demonstrates, this ancient technique can be used to create of the-moment effects. Some works are bold, even gritty. Every day, thousands of people pass the wood engravings that David Gentleman made for London Transport in 1978, which have been enlarged to platform scale.
Denne historien er fra February 22 2017-utgaven av Country Life UK.
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Denne historien er fra February 22 2017-utgaven av Country Life UK.
Start din 7-dagers gratis prøveperiode på Magzter GOLD for å få tilgang til tusenvis av utvalgte premiumhistorier og 9000+ magasiner og aviser.
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Happiness in small things
Putting life into perspective and forces of nature in farming
Colour vision
In an eye-baffling arrangement of geometric shapes, a sinister-looking clown and a little girl, Test Card F is one of television’s most enduring images, says Rob Crossan
'Without fever there is no creation'
Three of the top 10 operas performed worldwide are by the emotionally volatile Italian composer Giacomo Puccini, who died a century ago. Henrietta Bredin explains how his colourful life influenced his melodramatic plot lines
The colour revolution
Toxic, dull or fast-fading pigments had long made it tricky for artists to paint verdant scenes, but the 19th century ushered in a viridescent explosion of waterlili
Bullace for you
The distinction between plums, damsons and bullaces is sweetly subtle, boiling down to flavour and aesthetics, but don’t eat the stones, warns John Wright
Lights, camera, action!
Three remarkable country houses, two of which have links to the film industry, the other the setting for a top-class croquet tournament, are anything but ordinary
I was on fire for you, where did you go?
In Iceland, a land with no monks or monkeys, our correspondent attempts to master the art of fishing light’ for Salmo salar, by stroking the creases and dimples of the Midfjardara river like the features of a loved one
Bravery bevond belief
A teenager on his gap year who saved a boy and his father from being savaged by a crocodile is one of a host of heroic acts celebrated in a book to mark the 250th anniversary of the Royal Humane Society, says its author Rupert Uloth
Let's get to the bottom of this
Discovering a well on your property can be viewed as a blessing or a curse, but all's well that ends well, says Deborah Nicholls-Lee, as she examines the benefits of a personal water supply
Sing on, sweet bird
An essential component of our emotional relationship with the landscape, the mellifluous song of a thrush shapes the very foundation of human happiness, notes Mark Cocker, as he takes a closer look at this diverse family of birds